Andrea Mulder-Slater

by Andrea Mulder-Slater It's New Year's Eve and I just can't help but string through a long list of resolutions in my head. It's a sickness. I don't drink or smoke -- so quitting those vices is not an option. I eat pretty well and don't pack many extra pounds -- so dieting is not on my list. I'm really very nice to most everyone I meet and I volunteer for lots of good causes -- I just can't get any better. And, I'm modest and extremely humble (to a fault). Yet, every year end, I find myself thinking the same thoughts. Next year I will [fill in the blank] and I will definitely make sure I [fill in the blank] before next new year's eve. But alas, time marches on and things happen as they happen. So, this year, instead of the usual list of unattainable goals, I have come up with a doable set of resolutions. Feel free to steal it.  If I'm happy and I know it, I will clap my hands. If I'm happy and I know it, I will clap my hands.

by Andrea Mulder-Slater In a previous post , I talked about the importance of teaching art to children (of all ages). Now, I will talk about how you (as a parent or teacher) can help the young people in your life, learn about the arts... Take Field Trips Visiting a museum or art gallery is imperative when teaching about art and art history. Looking at art in a book, magazine or on the Internet is a good start, but it just isn't the same as seeing the work up close and personal. Most museums and galleries offer tours - specifically for school-aged children, especially if there is a special exhibit on display. Contact the educational department of the museum or gallery and ask if they have any resource materials you can share with your students prior to the trip. Once there, take time to look at works of art that interest all of your students.If it is impossible for you to visit a museum or gallery, do look through art books or view works online. Encourage students to pick out t

by Andrea Mulder-Slater As one of the creators of KinderArt.com , I often receive letters from teachers who work in public school systems where the arts are not a priority. Faced with dilemmas like how to raise test scores and how to stretch budgets as far as they can go, school board officials need to make tough decisions. It is always disturbing to hear of yet another set of district policy makers doing away with arts education in the schools. Trouble is, many hold the misconception that art is a superfluous, isolated subject when, in fact, nothing could be further from the truth... Art helps children understand other subjects much more clearly - from math and science to language arts and geography. Art nurtures inventiveness as it engages children in a process that develops self esteem, self-discipline, cooperation and self-motivation. Participating in art activities helps children develop the tools necessary for understanding human experience, adapt to and respect others&

by Andrea Mulder-Slater At our house, we empty the freezer once a year – right around the Christmas holidays -- partly because, as the months wear on, it becomes increasingly difficult to pick through the ice formations but mostly because we have to make room for turkeys. Now, when I say freezer, I’m not referring to one of those puny, attached-to-your-fridge jobs. Our freezer is a monster – lose-your-best-friend-Larry-if-you’re-not-careful freezers. I estimate it is around 10,000 cubic feet (or something close to it). Our freezer, despite its size, does little else but store turkeys – free-range, caged-up, young, old, stuffed, grease-injected... you name it – we’ve got it. Why so many? It’s simple. My family is cursed. We receive turkeys as gifts. We win turkeys at the gas station. Turkeys follow us home. We answer the door to find please-take-care-of-this-turkey turkeys. So, every year, around this time, the turkey storage unit (freezer) needs to be stripped, chipped and hos

by Andrea Mulder-Slater Waited until the final hour again, did you? For all of you who still need to pick up a gift for your uncle Ken, a little something for your husband Frank and a turkey for the dinner you are preparing for your entire family, I have a little present... Here are the top five ways to make last minute Christmas shopping more enjoyable for everyone (yes, even that big-haired woman who stepped on your head while successfully grabbing the last Xbox 360 from your sweaty palms). As an added bonus, if you follow my advice, you might just clear a path around yourself large enough to actually get your shopping done. You’re welcome. 5) While at the mall, jump on Santa’s lap and refuse to get off. 4) Hang jingle bells from your ears and shout, “Sleigh bells ring --- ARE YOU LISTENING?” 3) Sing , “ Santa Claus is coming to Town ” with an emphasis on the “ You Better Watch Out ” part of the song. 2) Place a “ Hello my name is Santa ” sticker on your bum. 1

By Andrea Mulder-Slater Anyone who knows me knows that beyond the coffee maker, I’m not real handy with the tools that can be found in a kitchen. Sure, I can load and empty a dishwasher and yeah, I have been known to fry an egg or two. Once, I even made a roast beef dinner, complete with potatoes, onions and – gasp – gravy. It’s not so much that I can’t cook – it’s that I hate doing it. However, kids (it would appear) have a way of changing our attitudes. So it was when the littlest one and I decided to bake banana bread this week. She LOVES the stuff and I’m rather fond of it as well. But baking from scratch is just so much work! Instead, I was spurred on by a fun find at the grocery store.  Simply Organic Banana Bread Mix , according to the company’s marketing department, is, “ A Gluten-free Simply Organic Banana Bread Mix that combines cinnamon with the intriguing warmth of allspice and wholesome brown rice flour to create flavor that never loses its appeal. The

by: Andrea Mulder-Slater “It snowed again last night.” Geoff already had the coffee on when I stumbled downstairs in my housecoat. It was Saturday morning – a nice day to sleep in. “Yeah.” I said, peering out the window into the semi-darkness. The truck was covered. So was the car. “That’s weird.” “What’s that?” asked Geoff. “The van – it’s completely clear.” Not a flake of snow had settled onto our burgundy van… We all forget things. My mom regularly leaves her sunglasses on random retail store countertops. My dad once forgot to pick me up after school, returning home instead with a container of milk and a newspaper. Geoff has, on more than one occasion, positioned coffee cups, wallets, and garage door openers on top of any one of a number of vehicles, over the years. Some items we’ve found back – others (like one garage door opener) were snatched by a gaggle of droll teens who delighted in opening and closing and opening and closing our door at all hours of

by Andrea Mulder-Slater If things were different... they'd be different. Instead, I drink my coffee. Cold.

By Andrea Mulder-Slater As a youngster, nothing was more exciting than watching Harry the hardware store man divvy up flat headed nails. Moving with the grace of a newborn calf and the speed of an earthworm, Harry, who was approximately 125 years old, would spend his days counting, sorting and color coding his nails. "Yeah it's a good day, no rain coming soon." he would say whenever anyone entered his happy hardware emporium. Of course, he also said that when someone asked him where to find the sand paper. Harry was a smart man, known to all the neighborhood children as, "that crazy guy who cleans his glasses with paint thinner". Harry was our hero, mostly because he was the only grown-up we knew who enjoyed Silly Putty as much as we did. Hanging on a peg, between the electrical plates and the washers, were always three packages of the wonder goo. It didn't matter what day you went into the hardware store or how many times you bought it, Harry always

by Andrea Mulder-Slater The man looks to the sky as the smoke rises from his pipe. I look at you and you say to me, The world could sure use a lot more air.

I've posted some images of my latest "Paper Paintings". Click HERE to see them...

by Andrea Mulder-Slater I'm afraid Afraid of what? You often ask me. Of loneliness - I answer. Don't be ridiculous, you tell me. You'll never be alone, I hear you say. As you quietly leave me. Always. Careful. To shut the door behind you.

by Andrea Mulder-Slater If you don't want to see life drawings (nudes) then just don't click ... No... really.

by Andrea Mulder-Slater On a day, just a day, quite like any other, Geoff was taken to hospital with pain in his lower back. Thinking it might be a form of arthritis, a resident doctor, training to become a rheumatologist, performed an examination. After carefully feeling each joint and calmly commenting on the absence of inflammation in the knees, ankles, wrists and fingers, the young doctor suddenly became visibly puzzled after she asked to see my husband's palms. She left the room and returned with another physician who also appeared mystified as both inspected the skin located at the base of my husband's fingers. Cautiously, the resident explained that she and her colleague were perplexed by what they saw. My husband glanced down at his hands and smiled. "Those," he said, "are calluses". No... really.

by Andrea Mulder-Slater My dad and I shared a love of words… especially flowery, elaborate words. Though his vocabulary was far, far greater than mine, he always appreciated the bits of stuff I came up with and I always endeavored to understand the things he wrote. It was quite by chance that I decided to incorporate my father’s words into my latest works of art. Paper, canvas and glue are the media of choice for me at the moment, and as I began to work with these materials, the pieces begged for words. My dad wrote - a lot - and upon his death, left behind, oodles and oodles of words. I kind of like the idea of keeping his memory alive by, in a sense, illustrating some of his sentences. I plan on (at some point) using my own words in this new series I am working on – but for now, his just seem to fit. Galileo Galilei pursued an interest he had developed in natural motion and the behavior of bodies of water. Words by Henry Mulder, 1939-2009 | Art by andreams (Andrea Mulder-

by Andrea Mulder-Slater My father Henry (Hank), was born Hindrik Mulder, in the Netherlands in 1939. He immigrated to Alberta, Canada in the 1950s with his parents, sisters and brother. As a young man he was lured by and lived in the hustle and bustle of large cities like Vancouver, Edmonton and Toronto. He spent his 20s and 30s, climbing the corporate ladder. His 40s and 50s were spent running a successful small business. He attended university, built his own house, designed computer programs and wrote fascinating articles. However... these were things he did – this was not who he was. I’m quite convinced my dad knew everything, regardless of the topic. My mom and I often referred to him as our walking encyclopedia. He read, all the time, and he sought out every opportunity to learn more because as he often said, “ A true sign of intelligence is admitting that you don’t know it all .” And, he could fix or build anything. Literally. At the age of four, I already knew how

by Andrea Mulder-Slater I met Geoff at art school – me in my first year, he in his last. Although it was most certainly not love at first sight (he was otherwise engaged, I was blissfully unaware), we did hit it off and became part of a group of friends who regularly shared time together. When he left school to discover other, more distant pastures, it laid the groundwork for a pattern, which would last for a period of several years. Every six months I would hear from Geoff, whose points of contact seemed to vary with the seasons. “Hi, I’m calling from a payphone in Smooth Rock Falls…” soon changed to, “Hey, I’m calling from my house in London...” to, “Hello, I’m calling from my cell phone… in your driveway.” Eventually, one thing led to another and at some point, I agreed to ride shotgun in his 1987 Volkswagen Scirocco. When the two of us eventually decided to be married, we had no delusions of grandeur. Let’s face it; two artists heading into the world together do not a giant

By Andrea Mulder-Slater Some time ago, I came to the realization that my life is a Folgers® commercial. In order to wake up every morning, I not only have to smell the coffee, I have to imbibe several litres of it, and I'm not the only one. Coffee, the sweet elixir of life, is the world's largest commodity (next to oil, and the Snuggie) and is produced in more than fifty countries at a rate of over 8 billion pounds annually. Wow... that's a lot of java. It's no surprise really, when you consider that our society revolves around the dark liquid. Coffee breaks, coffee tables, coffee cake, coffee houses... Ahhh, the aroma. Ahhh, the taste. Ahhh, the caffeine. Yes the caffeine, that's what we're really talking about here isn't it? An ordinary cup of joe contains about 150 mg of caffeine. That is roughly the amount that physicians regard as a therapeutic dose. Therapeutic? Yes. That's for all of you who think the roasted bean juice is bad for us. Caffe

Like most sayings - Time Heals All Wounds - is rooted in truth. Although my emotions are not nearly as raw as they were a year ago, the feeling today is as surreal as the day I watched my father pass away. My cousin, who experienced the devastating loss of her younger sister, was my pillar a year ago. She gave me such sage and sound advice, not the least of which included, to not turn special days into miserable ones. To put it bluntly, she said, "He was dead yesterday, he is dead today and he will be dead tomorrow." This helped me tremendously in getting through this year of "firsts". I don't want to create some sort of sick anniversary to commemorate his death. I think of him daily, not just on birthdays, New Years Day or the day he died. Friends and family, with the best of intentions, called, emailed and spoke about "it" - the elephant in the living room - yesterday, while others looked at us, painfully - without comment. I spent the day repeating

by Andrea Mulder-Slater Straight from the Who-the-Heck-Thought-of-This-and-More-Importantly-Why? files we have Foam Dancing - a groovy craze which originated in Spain. A throwback to the days when those wacky Romans indulged in the odd before-dinner orgy, a foam party involves lining a nightclub dance floor with something akin to rubber pool toys, and dumping ten thousand tons of frothy suds on scantily clad patrons, who I might add, pay for the privilege and sign I-will-not-sue-you-if-I-slip-and-die forms. No really, club owners from Houston to Detroit take their establishments, throw a plastic wall on the floor and using a modified artificial snow machine, blow foamy bubbles all over the place. Club Amnesia - an incredibly trendy bar in Miami Beach Florida - was one of the first North American clubs to offer "Foam Nights". One such evening (it was a Thursday) was detailed by a party go-er, "Within minutes, they were up to their waists in a sea of bubbles groping ea

By: Andrea Mulder-Slater The Junior Suite in the Hotel Napoleon was like nothing either of us had ever seen before. Well, not in real life anyway. The bed was piled high with pillows, the heavy velvet curtains reached clear up to the 14-foot ceilings, and the marble bathroom was large enough to house three small families. It was twenty minutes before we were able to locate the toilet, which was tucked neatly away between the gold plated shower and the walk-in closest, which, we later discovered, was just off the sitting room. How my husband Geoff and I (artists accustomed to sleeping in budget motels with the numbers 6 or 8 in their name) ended up in a luxury suite in the hotel Errol Flynn once referred to as, “The Place,” was thanks, in part, to nicotine. We were on a European art vacation, involving visits to four thousand museums, in three countries, over a period of ten days. After a memorable train ride from London to Paris, we checked into our main floor, standard, non-

by Andrea Mulder-Slater Valentine's Day has long offered many the opportunity to make up for a year's worth of neglect. It’s the one occasion where a few gooey chewies and a single red flower will make your sweetie swoon like there's no tomorrow. Give her a gift - for no reason - any other time of year and she wonders what you're trying to make up for. Am I right? Don't get me wrong, I'm all for this Valentine's Day stuff. Flowers, candy, cupids, hearts… it’s all so very special. But, have you ever sat wondering, hoping, that someone - anyone - would tell you how this whole ritual got started? Sure you have - and that’s why I'm here. So go ahead, put on something red, drink something warm and cinnamony, curl up on a fluffy pink chair, and read on. First off, lets clear one thing up. Valentine - a very virtuous and moral Saint - the man after whom this day is named - really had absolutely nothing to do with love and all things mushy. The only c

by: Andrea Mulder-Slater When I began interviewing musicians, I never expected to be propositioned by one. I was 21 years old and had just graduated from art school. Full of confidence, I stepped through the doors of a local entertainment newspaper, looking for an opportunity to write art exhibition reviews. The scruffy editor sitting behind the desk reeked of cigarette smoke and sarcasm. He thanked me for my interest, gave a quick sideways glance at the essays I had arranged on his desk, and informed me that he was in need of a CD reviewer… and a good stiff drink. It wasn’t the first time I would see him hung over. Though it was not what I was looking for, the promise of free music in exchange for a few words of criticism seemed like a pretty decent deal to me, so I told him I would give it a try and I left the office with a Gary Clail disc in my portfolio case. It took some parental coaxing to convince me I could actually write about music, but once I got the hang of it,

by Andrea Mulder-Slater I don't ski... not downhill anyway. I have been known to strap a pair of cross-country skis on my feet, but really, that's not much different than slipping down the driveway on the way to the mailbox. As a downhill skier, you are expected to obey certain rules like: "Please do not remove our trees with your face" and "Please refrain from skiing with one of our shrubs stuck to your head". These rules are put in place to protect you and others like you. Some resorts refer to these rules as "Your Responsibility Code" which makes sense, since you and only you - as a skier - are responsible for personal injury or property loss resulting from say, a mid-air collision with any natural or man-made object, including but not strictly limited to your best friend Larry. I can't ski for one very important reason... rule number one of the code. This rule states that you must remain in control and proceed in such a manner that yo